2022 Lexus NX hybrid (inc. 0-100) review: Why it's more than just a lux RAV4

CarExpert

A brand new infotainment system and high-tech head-up display makes the 2022 Lexus NX more than just a posh version of the Toyota Rav4. Paul Maric takes the Lexus NX hybrid for a drive to see whether it's something you should spend your cash on!  Hardness tester results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/121Auf6HGvaBqRToYcuAz94alin7Sw55SpOPECBDlnKE  More Lexus content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/lexus More Lexus NX content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/lexus/nx  Skip Ahead: Intro: 00:00 Exterior 0:54 Interior 4:53 Infotainment 6:46 Safety Tech 11:42 Practicality 13:05 On the Road 17:53 0-100km/h 20:30 Verdict 23:09  We review every new car on the market, bust car myths, cover the latest car tech and answer your burning questions.  Whether you need new car advice, purchase validation or simply love learning more about new cars and technology, we are your car experts.  Subscribe to Car Expert: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7DvMhvy3H7ntEgn9n3xQcQ?sub_confirmation=1  You'll find us dropping new video content three times a week. If you'd like to ask a question about one of our videos, simply leave us a comment. If you'd like to give us any feedback on our content, feel free to email us, or alternatively, hit us up on social media.  Finally, we want this channel to grow with your support and feedback. If there's anything you don't like or would like to see us change, we'd love to hear from you!  Follow us on social media to see what we're up to and to ask any questions!  CarExpert: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarExpertAus Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/CarExpertAus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carexpert.com.au  Paul Maric: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulMaric Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/PaulMaric Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaulMaric  #lexus #lexusnx #review

Transcript

00:00 G'day, I'm Paul. Now, this car behind me is one that you guys have been asking a lot about.

00:04 It's the all-new Lexus NX, and finally we've got our hands on one.

00:08 And I think this is probably the pick of the bunch.

00:10 It's the one that a lot of you have particularly been asking about.

00:13 This spec right here is the Lexus NX 350h F Sport All-Wheel Drive with Enhancement Pack 2.

00:21 A little bit of a mouthful. This is priced at a little under $85,000.

00:25 If that's too expensive, the whole range kicks off at a little over $60,000.

00:29 This competes with things like the BMW X3, the Mercedes-Benz GLC, and the Audi Q5.

00:35 So that gives you an idea of exactly how big it is.

00:37 Today we're going to do a detailed review of this car,

00:39 so if you do want to skip ahead to other parts of the review,

00:42 you can use the time codes on the screen, or if you're on YouTube,

00:45 scroll down and use the chapters below.

00:47 And if you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel,

00:49 press the bell icon, because that's going to tell you every single time we drive one of these.

00:52 So, let's talk design.

00:56 You've got eight external colours to pick from.

00:59 All but black and red are $1,750.

01:03 I don't know why it's such an enormous price tag just to get a colour that isn't black or red.

01:08 So, anyway, in terms of the design, so this shares a platform with the RAV4.

01:14 It sits on Toyota's TNGA platform, so beneath the skin it is effectively a RAV4.

01:20 It is slightly bigger than a RAV4, but they've completely changed the design.

01:23 And we talk about big grilles and BMW owning that segment,

01:27 but have a look at the size of this thing.

01:29 I can't even reach the other end of that.

01:30 It sort of starts all the way down there, comes all the way around here,

01:33 so it is a whopper of a grille.

01:35 But the strange thing is where the big grille looks kind of strange on a BMW,

01:40 it actually looks very normal here and fits into place.

01:43 I don't know whether it's the placement of the number plate or the logo.

01:45 Yeah, not entirely sure what it is, but I'm not totally offended by this.

01:50 So, lots of cooling there for the hybrid drivetrain.

01:53 In fact, that sort of middle section there is a little bit blocked off,

01:55 so you really only have cooling in that top and bottom sections.

01:58 You've got a radar behind this logo just here.

02:00 You've got a camera there for the front camera,

02:02 a little bit of piano black garnish down the bottom, and then also this brushed aluminium.

02:06 Sorry the car's so dirty, it absolutely bucketed down this morning on the gravel road.

02:10 We had to drive down to get here, meant that the car was filthy.

02:14 Over here you've got a tri-beam LED headlight.

02:17 It is an adaptive beam.

02:18 You also have an LED indicator and LED daytime running light.

02:22 Headlight washer just there as well that pops out to clean that, which will be useful for today.

02:26 And down here you've got a little bit more cooling for the side there

02:29 with a cornering light and also an LED fog light.

02:32 Whip around to the side.

02:34 Now, down here you've got a set of 20-inch alloy wheels.

02:38 I quite like this design.

02:39 It's got like a bit of a matte finish to it, but it is still a little glossy

02:43 and decent profile there on the tyre.

02:45 Now, this particular car, the F-Sport, comes with adaptive damping,

02:48 so I'll be keen to see how this performs on the road.

02:50 The RAV4 rides really nicely, so I'm hoping this is the same story.

02:54 And with the addition of adaptive damping, it might just give us a little bit more comfort

02:58 out there on the road.

02:59 A little bit of protection there on your wheel arch.

03:01 An F-Sport badge, so you know what you're driving.

03:04 You've got a camera in here, an indicator built into there,

03:08 and then a little bit of a chrome finish with piano black along the top there.

03:12 This particular spec comes with the enhancement pack,

03:14 which adds the big sunroof that goes sort of all the way back here.

03:17 And then you have these piano black roof rails.

03:19 You've got privacy glass, and I'm going to call out something interesting, the door handles.

03:23 So they look like the door handles that you just pull like any other car,

03:25 but when you put your finger behind there, there's actually a little button.

03:28 You pull that button and then it electronically releases that door latch.

03:32 So it's a really clever system, and while it looks like a regular door handle,

03:36 there's actually a little bit of a smart technology behind it there,

03:39 and I'll run you through why that exists a little later on.

03:42 Come around to the back of the car.

03:44 Now, I like what they've done at the back here.

03:45 So big LED strip along the top there.

03:48 It then blends in with these LED taillights, so that's a full LED cluster there.

03:52 I think it just looks really nice and smart, and it rounds out the back of this car.

03:57 Up the top there, you've got a shark fin aerial and then a spoiler here.

04:00 I reckon they missed a trick putting this under here.

04:03 They could have easily tucked that under so you don't actually have that in the way of things.

04:07 Buried just behind here is a tiny little camera.

04:10 This allows you to use your digital mirror looking out the back.

04:12 We have seen in Land Rover products, for example, they fit the camera up there,

04:15 but Lexus has chosen to put it there behind the glass.

04:18 Kind of smart when you consider that the wiper will clean it to prevent it from getting dirty.

04:22 Lexus lettering along the top there, and then the specification, and then all-wheel drive there.

04:26 A little bit of that brushed aluminium down the bottom there,

04:29 and then a diffuser section as well.

04:30 So I'm a fan of this design. I think it's a really smart looking car,

04:34 and at the moment, if you're faced with a 12-month wait for a RAV4,

04:37 this could be a good alternative.

04:39 Yes, it is significantly more expensive, but let me know what you reckon in the comments section below.

04:43 Is it a good looking vehicle, and would you go for this over a RAV4?

04:47 I understand there's a big price difference there,

04:48 but is it enough to actually convince you to move away from a RAV4

04:52 into something a little bit more premium?

04:54 So we are inside the Lexus NX.

04:56 So before I go through all of this, let's have a look at the key first.

05:00 So here it is. So you have lock, unlock, boot, panic.

05:04 Little Lexus thing down the bottom there.

05:07 You've also got a bit of metal on the side as well, and then a Lexus logo.

05:11 It's a proximity sensing key, so you leave that in your pocket,

05:14 then once you're inside and ready to rumble, you just hit the power button.

05:18 You can see it's heard me say Lexus, and it's waiting for me to actually give it a command,

05:23 so I'm going to avoid saying that so it doesn't annoy us.

05:26 There we go. Now, what about the design?

05:30 I think they have absolutely nailed this.

05:33 Have a look at how high tech all this looks.

05:35 That screen is enormous, and they've really gone to the effort here.

05:40 I mentioned earlier that this shares a platform with the RAV4,

05:42 but you would never ever know by sitting here.

05:45 It looks totally different to the RAV4.

05:47 So it has the Lexus premium touches, so all of this stuff is soft touch.

05:52 You have these red leather highlights that follow around the side there.

05:55 You've also got resting areas for your knee,

05:58 and then the red continues on the center here and on the seats as well.

06:00 So from a design perspective, I think they've done a wonderful job here

06:03 making this look and feel really, really premium.

06:06 So what about your touch points?

06:08 So that is nice and soft, soft on the door as well.

06:11 Our soft are our touch points.

06:12 Well, we've got our durometer.

06:13 We've tested the main surfaces in this cabin.

06:16 If you want to see how this car compares to others that we've tested before,

06:19 have a look at the link in the description.

06:20 Build quality, it's actually surprisingly not very solid through there.

06:26 It's a little bit wobbly.

06:28 And our door tests,

06:29 sounds nice and solid, and I will quickly point out as well,

06:35 this is the door handle.

06:36 So you push it in to open the door,

06:38 or you can pull it like that as an emergency release

06:42 if the power goes out and stops those door strikes from working.

06:45 Let's talk infotainment.

06:47 So this is probably the most exciting part about this car for me,

06:50 simply because Lexus infotainment systems have a history of being absolutely terrible,

06:54 and this on the face of it looks a whole lot better.

06:58 So I'm looking forward to having a little play with it now with you guys.

07:01 As funny as that sounds.

07:02 So the screen is 14 inches.

07:05 So it is a Whopper infotainment system,

07:07 and they've gone down the path of having this wide screen setup

07:10 instead of a big vertical screen or a really wide and narrow screen.

07:14 So I quite like exactly what they've done here,

07:17 and it really gives you a lot of perspective.

07:19 And it looks big while you're out driving,

07:21 like it is really just there in your face and you get a lot of detail on it.

07:24 So let's have a look at a breakdown of how it all works.

07:27 So down this bottom section is where you access your climate controls.

07:31 So these at the moment are blank,

07:33 but when you do switch the climate on,

07:35 these light up and then as you move your climate,

07:37 it will act to change those displays.

07:40 You then have a full screen navigation setup.

07:44 So that's really nice and fast.

07:45 And in terms of music, you have AM, FM, DAB plus digital radio.

07:50 Now I'll show you something interesting here.

07:52 This is capable of doing audio streaming via the internet.

07:59 So this is a connected vehicle,

08:00 and I'll run you through the connected services in a second,

08:02 but the audio streaming via the internet means you can play whatever track you want.

08:06 I also love the fact here on DAB radio as well that you can skip backwards and forwards.

08:11 If you've got a cool track or you've missed something on the news that's playing through DAB,

08:16 you can skip backwards to then figure out exactly what was going on.

08:19 So I love that setup and I think that's a really clever thing.

08:21 I haven't seen that on any other cars before.

08:23 I want to run you through the audio as well.

08:25 This as part of enhancement pack two includes a 17 speaker Mark Levinson sound system,

08:30 and it is a really good sound system with a lot of speakers.

08:33 So yeah, if you do enjoy your music, that's probably something you want to go for.

08:36 You have your telephone menu here.

08:38 You can see favorites, then you're able to dial and do everything you need to do.

08:42 That brings me on to smartphone mirroring.

08:44 So you have both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.

08:46 Disappointingly, it's wired.

08:48 I mean, come on, you've got a brand new infotainment system.

08:51 Surely it should be wireless, but it is a full screen integration here of CarPlay,

08:55 and I think that looks sensational.

08:57 Let's have a look at Android Auto.

08:59 So again, full screen integration, and then when you go back to the home menu,

09:02 it takes Google Maps onto that side.

09:04 So really nice setup, and unlike some cars where you can't actually do this,

09:08 I think it's good that this takes up that entire screen.

09:10 Now I want to run you through one other cool feature.

09:12 So this has connectivity to the internet using an embedded sim.

09:16 So you can see up there that it has that connectivity,

09:18 and this allows you to do things like SOS calls.

09:20 If you're involved in an accident, you're able to get connected to emergency services.

09:24 But the other cool thing is it allows you to have access to the Lexus app.

09:28 So the Lexus app shows your vehicle here,

09:33 and it allows you to have remote connectivity with the vehicle,

09:35 so you can remotely start it, set climate if you need to, lock and unlock it,

09:40 delegate driver access to it as well, and also send navigation destinations.

09:44 So works pretty well.

09:45 I've been sort of playing around with it,

09:47 and it seems to be a pretty straightforward system that reacts quickly as well.

09:51 They do a plug-in hybrid version of the NX,

09:54 and that's going to come in handy for things like your climate services,

09:56 because you can run it inside your garage at home,

09:58 and the vehicle won't actually switch on and fill your garage with gas.

10:03 So this is a really cool infotainment system.

10:06 In addition to all that stuff, it has voice controls,

10:09 so you're able to ask it things.

10:11 So let's try this.

10:12 Hey, Lexus, set the temperature to 22 degrees.

10:16 Setting the driver's seat temperature to 22 degrees.

10:23 Look at that!

10:25 That actually works.

10:27 Cool, I like that.

10:28 So that actually works quite well.

10:30 All right, let's move from the infotainment screen to the screen ahead of the driver.

10:34 So it's an 8-inch display.

10:35 You can see the edges of it just there.

10:37 The screen is interesting because you can configure what's going on there.

10:40 As you switch between the drive modes, it changes as well.

10:43 But the thing I find most fascinating is the steering wheel controls

10:47 and how they interact with the screen and the head-up display.

10:50 So much like what Tesla has done with their steering controls,

10:54 they don't actually label anything,

10:55 and that means you can assign different functions to these down the track.

10:58 So these two outer edges, they don't have any labeling.

11:00 What happens is as you rub your finger over this,

11:03 it presents on the head-up display the different options you have for these controls.

11:09 Then what it does is if you push that, it changes those controls.

11:12 So you basically double the functionality of your steering wheel controls

11:15 without cluttering everything ahead of you.

11:17 And that applies down here as well.

11:18 When we want to clear that warning, it says to push and hold this,

11:21 and then it gives us access to that screen.

11:23 Then in addition to that, when we want to flick between different displays down here,

11:27 we press this button again to change exactly what is appearing.

11:31 So I think this is a really innovative setup,

11:34 and it's cool to see that Lexus is thinking outside the box.

11:36 And I'm hoping this translates to other Lexus and Toyota products in the future,

11:40 because, yeah, it is pretty cool.

11:42 Moving on to safety technology.

11:43 So you have forward and reverse AEB.

11:45 It comes with cyclist and pedestrian detection.

11:48 You have a lane departure warning, a lane keeping assistant.

11:51 You've got radar cruise control.

11:53 Now this is cool.

11:54 This is the camera that I mentioned earlier.

11:57 You can flick between looking out the back and also the digital display.

12:01 I also mentioned earlier that there is a purpose for the electronic strikes on the doors.

12:06 This comes with a safe exit assistant.

12:08 So it means that if I go to get out of the car,

12:09 but there's a vehicle, a cyclist or somebody coming

12:12 that's going to get injured by being opening the door,

12:14 it prevents this from working.

12:16 So that's the whole reason they do that,

12:17 because if it was just a manual release,

12:19 there would be no way to stop that handle from opening.

12:21 So that's a really good safety feature there.

12:23 It also has blind spot monitoring.

12:25 You get rear cross traffic alert.

12:26 There's 10 airbags inside the car.

12:28 It also has front and rear parking sensors and a 360 camera.

12:32 I'll show you what that looks like.

12:34 So the view is not too bad.

12:37 The screen is, well, actually the camera is a little bit dirty,

12:39 but the actual quality of the screen isn't too bad.

12:42 That's your top down view.

12:43 And you can see as I move the wheel there, those guidelines shift.

12:46 We can then go for a sort of tucked in angle view or a wider angle,

12:50 depending on which one we want to choose.

12:51 So yeah, pretty straightforward setup.

12:53 And you've got your button here for the self-parking feature.

12:56 By the way, if you don't know how parking sensors work

12:58 or how all that self-parking stuff works,

13:00 click up here to watch a video that we recorded

13:02 where we demonstrated all of the technologies you can get on the market today.

13:05 Now let's get along to your practicality

13:07 and we'll start off with your connectivity.

13:09 So you have a USB-C port there, a USB-A port next to it.

13:13 You have wireless phone charging, but check this out.

13:16 You can tuck that away and that gives you access to a little storage nook

13:19 down the bottom with a 12-volt outlet.

13:22 And then when you do want your phone back, you just bring that back out.

13:25 So really clever innovation.

13:26 I haven't seen a car before that has a wireless phone charging tray

13:30 that allows your phone to just disappear so it doesn't clutter everything up.

13:34 In terms of storing your phone, it can live down there on the wireless charger.

13:38 Or you can pop it in the cup holders very easily.

13:40 And cup holders, we have our coffee.

13:42 I had someone making fun of me the other day that no one else drinks coffee like this.

13:46 Well, I do, so it applies to me.

13:49 And the coffee fits in here, which is good.

13:51 The lid is intact.

13:53 It means it won't leak when you try and get it out.

13:56 And on our bottle test, that fits in there without any dramas.

13:59 And then inside the door, small bottle fits fine.

14:02 We'll try our big bottle now as well.

14:04 It fits in there with a bit of a squeeze and we'll try it in there.

14:09 Doesn't fit inside the door.

14:10 Now, people have mentioned that they want us to use reusable bottles

14:12 instead of these single-use bottles.

14:14 Let us know whether you care.

14:16 If enough of you do, I'll go and buy one to satisfy you.

14:19 But let me know in the comments section below what you think.

14:22 Now, what about your other storage options?

14:24 So you have a centre console here that's pretty deep.

14:27 I quite like the look of that.

14:28 And then it opens both ways, similar to the new Land Cruiser.

14:31 Down here next to the driver's knee, you've got a little storage nook.

14:33 You have a glove box over here, which is reasonably sized,

14:37 but full of the manual and a couple of other bits and pieces.

14:40 And finally, you have a sunglasses holder up the top.

14:42 OK, and comfort.

14:45 So I mentioned earlier, you get dual-zone automatic climate control.

14:48 That all pops up there when you switch that on.

14:50 You have heated and cooled seats.

14:53 You have a heated steering wheel with this particular spec.

14:55 And in terms of the seats themselves, have a look at this design.

14:59 So F-Sport emblazoned up the top there.

15:02 Perforations for the cooling and then a mix of red and black.

15:05 Super comfy seat as well, so it hugs you in nicely.

15:08 Plenty of seat adjustments too, so you can go forwards, backwards.

15:11 The back can go forwards, backwards.

15:12 You can lift the base of the seat up.

15:15 You can also adjust your bolsters as required.

15:18 You have seat memory over here for the driver.

15:21 Then the steering wheel offers both tilt and reach adjustment that is electrically adjustable.

15:27 And on our reach test, all of this stuff is easy to reach while you're driving.

15:30 So if you do want more details on the Lexus NX, we have a showroom set up at our website,

15:36 and that basically gives you more information on the entire NX range instead of just the car

15:40 that we're testing here.

15:41 If you do want to see that, click up here to be taken to the Lexus NX showroom.

15:45 So backseat of the NX, let's start off with your room.

15:50 So knee room is pretty good.

15:52 Toe room is excellent, and headroom is reasonable.

15:55 I think if I was a little taller, I'd be touching that.

15:57 And that's because we've got our big roof here.

15:59 So very nice looking setup, and it's a sunroof as well, so it opens up.

16:03 In terms of your other creature comforts, you've got mat pockets in the back of the seats,

16:07 air vents here for some cooling, two USB-C ports down here, plus a 12-volt outlet.

16:13 You've got ISOFIX points and top tether points as well for the little ones.

16:17 Center armrest here with two cup holders.

16:19 Fits our bottle in nicely.

16:21 Couple of little teeth there.

16:23 We've also got bottle holders inside the door.

16:25 Now, let's do our window test.

16:29 See if it goes all the way down.

16:32 Bang, look at that, it does.

16:33 Very impressive.

16:34 So yeah, plenty of room back here.

16:36 It kind of looks like a small car on the outside, but I'm comfortably sitting back here as an adult.

16:41 So yeah, pretty impressed.

16:42 So let's talk cargo space.

16:44 Let's crack this open.

16:46 So we are talking about a little over 500 litres of cargo space here in its standard configuration.

16:53 Keep in mind though, because this is a hybrid, you're going to have a little bit of your space

16:56 robbed because there is an electric motor under here, but I'll show you some of the

16:59 storage you have beneath here.

17:00 So as you pull this back, you've got a deep cavity just down here.

17:03 Behind this cover, you have your battery.

17:06 And then what you can also do is pull the whole thing back to give you a little bit

17:10 more space down here where you've got a warning triangle and a little repair kit as well.

17:14 You've got a little net off to the side there, hooks as well, and a 12 volt outlet.

17:19 So it is actually a pretty decent size boot when you look at it from that regard.

17:23 I'll get rid of this to show you what the space is like when you expand it a little bit.

17:28 Folds out of the way.

17:29 I'll show you what it's like with our bags in just before we drop the seats.

17:33 Look at that, our suitcase is back.

17:37 So you can see there what it looks like, medium-sized suitcase.

17:40 And then we will drop that second row.

17:43 There it is.

17:47 So with the second row dropped, you have a little over 1100 litres of cargo space.

17:51 So we hit the road in the NX.

17:56 Now powering this is an interesting combo.

17:57 So you have an internal combustion engine that's naturally aspirated,

18:00 and then you have electric motors on the front and rear axle.

18:04 Now the internal combustion engine, it's a two and a half litre four-cylinder petrol engine.

18:08 It alone makes 140 kilowatts of power and just under 250 newton metres of torque.

18:14 But the electric components then add to that.

18:16 So they add 179 kilowatts of power and almost 400 newton metres of torque.

18:21 Now you might be wondering, how does all of that work?

18:24 Well, you can't really combine all of this stuff together

18:26 because you reach peaks at different parts of the rev band.

18:30 So with an internal combustion engine, typically you reach your power peak right at the end.

18:34 Your torque peak can be early or late depending on what type of engine it is.

18:37 But with electric, it's all instant in terms of the torque that you're hitting.

18:41 So it really does depend on how you want to measure it.

18:43 But what does it feel like behind the wheel?

18:45 That's probably the most important part.

18:47 When you're wafting along like this, it is just in full electric mode.

18:50 So you can see the little EV symbol there with light throttle applications.

18:53 It stays in electric mode and then pulls along nicely.

18:56 But then it will kick the internal combustion engine on when it needs to

19:00 or when the battery is low.

19:01 You can see the battery readout down the bottom.

19:03 When you do punch it, you get that full complement of the internal combustion engine

19:08 and the electric drivetrain as well.

19:10 And the fascinating thing here is that it all feels really nice and progressive.

19:14 It's just like Toyota's other hybrid products where you never feel like it doesn't know what

19:18 it's doing.

19:19 It's never overly intrusive.

19:20 It's always assisting you in doing exactly what you think it should be doing.

19:23 Even when it comes to slowing down, you can apply brake pressure.

19:26 It will go into charging mode like you can see on the screen there.

19:29 It'll charge the batteries with regen and then you can come to a full halt until the

19:33 mechanical brakes take over and then the car comes to a complete stop.

19:37 So yeah, I really like this combination and the drivetrain is great.

19:40 It's all sent through a CVT.

19:42 CVT in my opinion is the best way to do a hybrid because you have linear acceleration.

19:47 It doesn't feel like it's changing gears constantly.

19:49 And in this instance, when you do nail it, you just get a whole bunch of noise there

19:54 because the CVT is just doing what it can to keep everything moving at its peak.

19:58 Now, fuel economy.

19:59 Now this is the interesting part.

20:00 Obviously being a hybrid, it should be pretty good.

20:02 Lexus claims a combined figure of 5 litres per 100 k's.

20:06 We are currently sitting on 6.8.

20:11 So it is above that number.

20:14 This car has been predominantly doing city driving before it came out here.

20:17 So it probably is going to be a little bit better with a few more k's under its belt,

20:21 but it's still a really good figure when you consider this is the size of an Audi Q5

20:25 and it is using such a small amount of fuel.

20:27 Lexus claims a 0-100 time of 7.7 seconds.

20:34 This is how it went up against our stopwatch.

20:43 [Car engine]

20:50 What's it like in terms of noise?

20:52 Well, the engine, yes, it does get a little thrashy when you get stuck into it,

20:56 but when it is cruising along, it's pretty quiet.

20:59 And obviously when it's in EV mode, it makes barely any noise,

21:01 but I don't really get a great deal of tyre noise, even on this coarse chip surface.

21:05 I can't hear any wind noise either.

21:07 So they've done a really good job of insulating all of the noise that is coming

21:10 into the cabin from the road surface.

21:12 Now, one of the things I mentioned earlier, this rides on the TNGA platform,

21:15 which shares components with other Toyota products, including the RAV4.

21:19 The difference here though, is the adaptive suspension.

21:22 Look, I thought the RAV4 rode really nicely.

21:24 This takes it to another level.

21:25 It is incredibly smooth and just great to drive here behind the wheel,

21:29 even on a country road where you do get these sections here

21:32 where you have to pop off the road for a second.

21:34 It is really nice and smooth.

21:36 And then when you progress through the drive modes,

21:38 it gets firmer as that adaptive damping kicks in and starts

21:42 making everything a little more aggressive, including the steering wheel.

21:45 So yeah, I think they've done a great job here with the tuning,

21:47 and it really feels like it is suited to Australia's varying road conditions.

21:51 Now, how sporty is the F Sport?

21:55 Let's put it into Sport Plus.

21:56 Throw it through our corner.

21:59 See how it feels.

22:01 It's actually pretty good.

22:04 It feels engaging.

22:06 You know what I mean?

22:06 It's got that punch from the hybrid drivetrain,

22:08 so you're getting the electric kick in the back.

22:10 Sits nice and flat as well, and you get a bit of feel through the steering as well.

22:14 It actually feels like a sporty Lexus, which is cool,

22:16 even though it does share all of those components with the RAV4.

22:19 It doesn't actually feel anything like a RAV4, which is good news.

22:22 Now, what about your visibility?

22:25 So down the front there, it's great.

22:27 I can kind of see the edges of the bonnet.

22:28 The wing mirrors are huge.

22:29 I've got blind spot monitors built into them.

22:31 Visibility out the back is good.

22:33 So you've got this digital mirror that gives me good visibility out the rear,

22:36 but then when you flick it on, you get that digital image.

22:39 And look, it takes a little bit of time to get used to,

22:41 but I actually quite like that setup.

22:42 It's very clear, and it helps me in terms of being able to see everything around me.

22:46 Let's talk low speed manoeuvres.

22:48 So turning circle of 11.6 metres, and the steering is really light at low speeds.

22:52 You've also got that active park assistant here with this particular spec,

22:55 and that means that it'll be able to get you in and out of parks kind of hands-free.

22:59 You don't need to sort of do too much.

23:00 It will take care of the whole process.

23:02 [Music]

23:06 So the Lexus NX.

23:11 So I was expecting this to just feel like a RAV4, to be honest.

23:14 This feels totally different.

23:15 I think if you didn't tell people that these two were the same sort of car underneath,

23:20 they'd never believe you.

23:21 So if you do like the principles of the RAV4,

23:23 but you do want something a whole lot more premium,

23:26 I think this is a really sensible purchase option.

23:28 Lexus has gone super upmarket with this,

23:30 and it actually feels like it's worth its price.

23:32 When you look at the X3 Q5,

23:34 you really do have to spend mega dollars to get the kind of interior equipment

23:38 that you're getting here in the NX.

23:39 So, and this is actually probably the spec I'd pick as well.

23:42 I love the all-wheel drive RAV4 Cruiser Hybrid,

23:45 and I think this drivetrain in this car really sort of works a treat as well.

23:48 So, big fan of it.

23:49 Now let me know, have you ordered one of these?

23:51 Have you picked one up?

23:53 What is it like to live with, and are you enjoying it so far?

23:55 Let me know in the comments section below.

23:57 If you did enjoy this video, please make sure you hit the like button.

24:00 Share it with your mates.

24:01 And if you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel and press the bell icon.

24:05 But until next time, take it easy.

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